Gear Up for Gorillaz Live at Sessions

Don't ever assume that Damon Albarn is in this music game for any reason other than to enjoy a good jam. "There's nothing laborious about making music," Albarn told Spinner when Gorillaz visited AOL's New York offices for a Sessions taping. "I would never want to give the impression that we're doing this for any other reason than we just love it."

Even with the advanced storyline that the trilogy of Gorillaz albums has followed, Albarn's role doesn't necessarily follow that of a storyteller. Instead, he's more likened to a conductor, where he's working overtime to try and figure out how his diverse palate of sounds is going to all come together.

"It does take a long time," Albarn said. "For example, with ['Plastic Beach'], some of the recording was done in the Middle East, in Damascus. Some was done in New York, some was done in London, and all the orchestral openings were recorded at the old Rolls-Royce factory in Derby[, England]. I recorded an awful lot of music for this record; about 80 pieces of music in total, so, theoretically there is a Part Two and Part Three of 'Plastic Beach,' if we ever felt motivated. It's just because it's so eclectic, it takes a long time for you to actually get a picture because we don't start with a picture or an idea. We start with a very loose idea of 'Plastic Beach,' which probably means something different to me than it does to [artist] Jamie [Hewlett], but we evolve. "

Indeed, 'Plastic Beach' emerged in the five-year span after the last Gorillaz album, 2005's 'Demon Days.' The idea for 'Plastic Beach' actually came when Albarn and Hewlett were vacationing together two years ago. "We were all on holiday in Devon[, England], Damon's place," Hewlett recalled. "We were discussing a friend of ours who had just been to some festival and had done a show, GSS -- Gorillaz Sound System -- and he was telling us the reaction from the crowd to all of the Gorillaz songs and sort of got us excited about doing another album, that there were still a lot of people out who were interested."

After notable performances at this year's Coachella and Glastonbury festivals, it's actually hard to conceive of a world that wasn't interested in Gorillaz.

To see Gorillaz's incredible performance for AOL, check out Sessions next Monday, July 12.